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and one of which is crowded back by the other, or between two terms or idioms which correspond to
the same idea. This struggle is a conflict between opposite theses implicit in every word or idiom
which tends to substitute itself for another word or grammatical form. . . .
The conclusion of society’s logical duel occurs in three different ways. (1) It quite often happens
that one of the two adversaries is suppressed merely by the natural prolongation of the other’s
progress. For example, the Phœnician writing had only to continue to spread to annihilate the
cuneiform. The petroleum lamp had only to be known to cause the brazier of nut oil, a slight
modification of the Roman lamp, to fail into disuse in the shanties of Southern France. Sometimes,
however, a moment arrives when the progress of even the favoured rival is checked by some
increasing difficulty in dislodging the enemy beyond a certain point. Then, (2) if the need of settling
the contradiction is felt strongly enough, arms are restored to, and victory results in the violent
suppression of one of the two duellists. Here may be easily classed the case in which an authoritative,
although non-military, force intervenes, as happened in the vote of the Council of Nicaea in favor of
the Athanasian creed, or in the conversion of Constantine to Christianity, or as happens in any
important decision following upon the deliberations of a dictator or assembly. In this case, the vote or
decree, like the victory in the other case, is a new external condition which favors one of the two
rival theses or volitions at the expense of the other and disturbs the natural play of spreading and
competing imitations somewhat as a sudden climatic change resulting from a geological accident in a
given locality disturbs the propagation of life by preventing the multiplication of some naturally
fertile animal or vegetal species and by facilitating that of others which otherwise had been less
prolific. Finally, (3) the antagonists are often seen to be reconciled, or one of them is seen to be
wisely and voluntarily expelled through the intervention of some new discovery or invention. . . .
Now that we have discussed the inventions and discoveries which fight and replace each other, I
have to deal with those which aid and add to each other. It must not be inferred from the order I have
followed that progress through substitution originally preceded progress through accumulation. In
reality, the latter necessarily preceded, just as it plainly follows, the former. The latter is both the
alpha and the omega; the former is but a middle term. . . .
But we should not overlook the fact that the kind of accumulation which precedes substitution by
means of logical duels is different from that which follows it. The first kind consists of a weak
aggregation of elements whose principal bond lies in not contradicting one another; the second, in a
vigorous group of elements which not only do not contradict one another, but, for the most part,
confirm one another. And this should be so, because of the continually growing need of strong and
comprehensive belief. From what has preceded we can already see the truth of this remark; it will
presently become still more apparent. I will show that along all lines there are two distinct kinds of
inventions or discoveries, those that are capable of indefinite accumulation (although they may also
be replaced) and those that, after a certain degree of accumulation has been reached, must, if progress
is to continue, be replaced. Now, the distribution of both kinds takes place quite naturally in the
course of progress. The first both precede and follow the second, but in the latter instance, after the
exhaustion of the second, they present a systematic character which they previously lacked. . . .
We have seen that social progress is accomplished through a series of substitutions and
accumulations. It is certainly necessary to distinguish between these two processes; and yet
evolutionists have made the mistake, here as elsewhere, of merging them together. Perhaps the term
evolution is badly chosen. We may call it social evolution, however, when an invention quietly
spreads through imitation—the elementary fact in society; or even when a new invention that has
already been imitated grafts itself upon a prior one which it fosters and completes. And yet why